Developmental and transcriptional responses of maize to drought stress under field conditions.

ABSTRACT: Drought is a common abiotic stress which significantly limits global crop productivity. Maize is an important staple crop and its yield is determined by successful development of the female inflorescence, the ear. We investigated drought stress responses across several developmental stages of the maize B73 inbred line under field conditions. Drought suppressed plant growth, but had little impact on progression through developmental stages. While ear growth was suppressed by drought, the process of spikelet initiation was not significantly affected. Tassel growth was reduced to a lesser extent compared to the observed reduction in ear growth under stress. Parallel RNA-seq profiling of leaves, ears, and tassels at several developmental stages revealed tissue-specific differences in response

SUBMITTER: Danilevskaya ON 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6589525 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature